Prospecting & Detecting
Becoming a Successful Detectorist
May 2017 by Rod Fitzhugh
During my adventures I’ve learned a few key best practices that help me to consistently find gold nuggets with my detectors. You can apply many of these best practices to any type of prospecting. These best practices are really common sense; however, they are easy to neglect.
How to Stake Your Own Mining Claims—Part I
Many new prospectors start out prospecting in public areas and club claims, and this is perfectly fine, but the next step in the progression of becoming an experienced prospector is to locate and stake your own mining claims. What Happened to The Gold Prospecting and Mining Summit?
We continue to seek out a patented mining property with an owner who is willing to host such an event with a water supply and enough remaining gold to make it worthwhile for the students.
Critical Minerals: Titanium
The metal is expensive, not because it is rare but because of the expense to produce and work it. The minerals mined for titanium are all oxides, unlike many base metals that are mostly mined as sulfide minerals.
Twenty Minutes on a Five-inch Dredge
The first thing I realized was this was not a toy—this thing had power and I needed to really pay attention. I got into position, took a deep breath, and pushed that monster into the hard pack.
Refractory Gold Processing
After your excitement peaks when you first receive the high gold assay from the vein you just exposed, you ponder how you will extract and sell your gold. You will need to develop a flow sheet for your process to optimize your recovery and minimize your costs and permit requirements.
So Where's The Gold?
...we finally got back to this exploration effort. The old works there were up above the old camp, which was very significant in size.
A Successful Trip Through Gold Basin
This time we took the detectors. Roger had worked that spot very well and wanted to see if my new detector would uncover any gold he might have missed.
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• Legislative and Regulatory Update
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• Ask The Experts: What should I do with a large amount of old placer concentrates?
• Shaker Tables for Processing Hard Rock Ores
• Hand Panning Micro-Fine Gold
• Sampling, Hydro-Shocking & Cleaning Quartz-Gold Specimens
• My Lucky Thirteen Nuggets
• Crushing, Grinding and Pulverizing
• A Break in the Weather
• From the Editor
• Prospecting Knowledge -- Pass It On!
• Melman on Gold & Silver
• Mining Stock Quotes and Mineral & Metal Prices
• Over The Divide: Miles John Mitchell
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